Hidden Assets and Non-Disclosure

The Duty of Full and Frank Disclosure

In financial remedy proceedings each of you owes the court full, frank and clear disclosure of all your financial and other relevant circumstances. The duty is owed to the court, not only to each other: in Gohil v Gohil the Supreme Court explained that without it the court cannot perform its own duty under section 25(2) of the Matrimonial Causes Act 1973 to weigh each party's financial resources, and that one spouse cannot excuse the other from complying.

The duty runs until a final order is made and extends to material changes discovered along the way. In court it is met through Form E, the financial statement each party must exchange and file not less than 35 days before the first appointment, verified by a statement of truth and accompanied by the documents the form demands. Proceedings for contempt of court may be brought against anyone who makes a false statement in a document verified by a statement of truth without an honest belief in its truth, although such proceedings may be brought only by the Attorney General or with the permission of the court.

The duty applies just as much when you settle by agreement: a consent order rests on a statement of information from each party, and an order made by consent can be set aside for fraud or material non-disclosure like any other.

What Counts as Hidden Assets or Non-Disclosure

Non-disclosure ranges from a forgotten savings account to a deliberate scheme. The situations that come up most often:

• bank, investment or cryptocurrency accounts left off Form E
• a business shown on incomplete accounts, or income routed through a loan account, a new partner or a relative
• a bonus, share award, sale or flotation in prospect but not mentioned: Sharland v Sharland turned on an undisclosed plan to float a company
• property or money moved to family members, into a trust or overseas before or during proceedings
• an inheritance, a pension or an overseas asset simply omitted

What matters is whether the omission is material: whether the court, knowing the truth, would have made a significantly different order. A trivial omission does not reopen a settlement.

Where money is being moved rather than hidden, section 37 of the Matrimonial Causes Act 1973 allows the court, once proceedings for financial relief have been brought, to restrain a disposition intended to defeat the claim, or to set aside one already made unless the recipient gave value for it in good faith and without notice of that intention. Civil partners have the equivalent power in paragraph 74 of Schedule 5 to the Civil Partnership Act 2004. Urgent applications are covered on our freezing orders page.

Finding Hidden Assets: Evidence and the Court's Tools

The starting point is the disclosure itself. Form E requires 12 months of statements for every bank account, any property valuation obtained in the last six months, two years of business accounts, a cash equivalent statement for each pension, the last P60 and three payslips, and the last tax assessment for the self-employed. Gaps between those documents and the lifestyle you know, unexplained transfers and round-sum payments to individuals are the usual signs.

Not less than 14 days before the first appointment each party files a questionnaire seeking further information and documents, and at that hearing the court decides which questions must be answered and which documents produced. The Financial Remedies Guide 2026 says a questionnaire should not exceed four pages of A4 and that a longer one is only likely to be approved where complexity, expressly including alleged non-disclosure, justifies it.

Where the documents sit with a bank, an employer or an accountant, the court may order disclosure against a person who is not a party under Part 21 of the Family Procedure Rules, but only on evidence and only where disclosure is necessary to dispose fairly of the proceedings or to save costs. A company interest whose value is disputed may need an expert valuation, dealt with on our business assets in divorce page.

Where disclosure remains deficient, the court does not give up. In Moher v Moher the Court of Appeal said the court should still seek to determine the extent of the non-disclosing party's resources, may draw such adverse inferences as are justified by the nature and extent of that party's failure to engage properly with the proceedings, and may in an appropriate case infer that the resources are sufficient to make the proposed award fair. Inferences must be properly drawn and reasonable, and the court need not fix a figure.

What you must not do is help yourself. In Imerman v Tchenguiz the Court of Appeal held that the so-called Hildebrand rules, once thought to allow a spouse to take and copy the other's documents, cannot be justified in law on any basis. Accessing a partner's computer, emails or papers may be actionable, the material may have to be returned and its use restrained. The lawful routes are the ones above, or a freezing or search order where the risk justifies it.

How the Process Works

Where non-disclosure is suspected, the steps are usually these:

1. We take a detailed account of the family finances as you know them, so the other side's disclosure is tested rather than accepted at face value.
2. Before any application the pre-application protocol expects full and honest disclosure from both of you, with Form E as the template. Where that fails, we issue Form A and the timetable in financial remedy proceedings begins.
3. Forms E are exchanged and filed at least 35 days before the first appointment. We analyse the other side's statement and every attachment line by line.
4. We draft a questionnaire aimed at the gaps and, at the first appointment, ask the court to order the answers, the documents and any third party disclosure or expert valuation the case needs.
5. If the answers still do not add up, we ask the court at the final hearing to draw the inferences the evidence supports and to reflect the conduct in costs.
6. If an order has already been made, we apply to the court that made it under rule 9.9A to set it aside, and ask for a rehearing confined to the issues the non-disclosure affects.

Court fees apply to a financial order application and some later applications: the current amounts are on the GOV.UK court fees page, and our charges are on our family law fees page.

Setting Aside an Order for Non-Disclosure

A financial remedy order, including one made by consent, can be set aside under rule 9.9A where no error of the court is alleged. The recognised grounds include fraud, material non-disclosure, certain limited types of mistake, and a subsequent event, unforeseen and unforeseeable when the order was made, which invalidates its basis. An order made on or after 22 April 2014 is set aside by the court that made it, and an order made before that date by the family court. Where reasonably possible the same judge deals with the application. An alleged error by the court is an appeal instead.

In Sharland v Sharland the court held that fraud unravels all, and that the only exception is where the person responsible shows the fraud would not have influenced a reasonable person to agree and the court would not have made a significantly different order. In Gohil v Gohil a 2004 consent order recited that the wife believed her husband had not given full disclosure; the court held that such words have no legal effect, that the duty cannot be waived by the other spouse, and that the rules on fresh evidence on appeal have no place in a set aside application. Once a ground is established the court ordinarily directs a rehearing, which need not start from scratch where the affected issues can be isolated.

When Legal Advice Is Especially Important

Advice matters most where:

• the other party runs a business, is paid in bonuses or shares, or has income that never reaches a payslip
• assets sit abroad, in a trust or in a relative's name (see also divorce with overseas assets)
• money is moving now and an urgent application may be needed
• a final or consent order has already been made and you have since discovered undisclosed assets
• you are the one accused of non-disclosure and need to answer a questionnaire or a set aside application

Where money is withheld or moved as a means of control, that can be economic abuse: see our domestic abuse and injunctions pages, and call 999 in immediate danger; the National Domestic Abuse Helpline is 0808 2000 247.

Child maintenance sits outside this page: it is usually arranged between parents or through the Child Maintenance Service, and our child maintenance advice page explains where the court still has a role.

How RakLAW Solicitors Can Help

We handle non-disclosure cases as part of the financial settlements work we do from 42 Shad Thames in Southwark, a short walk from Tower Bridge. The firm was founded by solicitor Rakesh Prajapati, and we say early whether the disclosure you have justifies a questionnaire, a third party application or a set aside application, and just as plainly when it does not.

RakLAW Solicitors is privately funded and does not offer legal aid. The first 15 minutes are free: book a free consultation or call 0203 345 2000, and bring whatever disclosure you already have.